This online index is a compilation of death notices appearing in the Dziennik Chicagoski, Chicago's Polish daily newspaper, for the years 1890-1929. The Polish Genealogical Society originally published indexes for the years 1890-1929 as a series of four books, which are available for sale by PGSA and available at many libraries in the United States.

exact match: enter the name exactly the way you want it found (e.g., Adam will find ONLY Adam).match first: enter the first part of name to be matched (e.g., Adam will find Adam, Adamik, Adamowski). wildcard search: enter any part of the name (e.g., Adam will find Adam, Adamik, Adamowski, and Hadam).

During these years the newspaper was in its infancy, and death notices were
neither numerous nor as detailed as they would later become.

In order to maintain consistency, the online index will not include the names
of all relatives mentioned in each death notice as was done in the printed
version of the death notice index.

1900-1909

By this time, the circulation of the newspaper more than doubled, which meant
that not only was the Polish population in Chicago growing but also that more
and more Poles were choosing to have death notices printed in it.

Zmarli (also called Umarli): this was a
list of Poles who had died recently, and was an "official list",
presumably from whatever agency kept vital statistics for Chicago at
that time. Zmarli merely list the deceased's name, date of death, age,
and address.

If a death notice entry was a Zmarli this fact is noted in the
comments column of the online index. Any information not given is noted
with"--" in the appropriate index column.

If any relatives with different surnames are mentioned in a death notice, they
have been listed as cross-references in the comments column. The same is true
if any maiden-names (nee) or aliases (aka) are mentioned.

1910-1919

A standard feature of the newspaper throughout this decade is the Notatki
Reportera (Reporter's Notes). Sometimes these Reporter's Notes mention
the deaths of people who never appeared in any death notice; sometimes the
notes give additional details about the circumstances of the subject's death.
These entries are noted as Notatki Reportera in the comments
column of the online index.

If an death notice entry was a Zmarli this fact is noted in
the comments column of the online index.

1920-1929

Users of the printed index volumes will notice a difference in the online format
from what appeared in print. In order to maintain consistency across the multiple
volumes comprising the death notice index, cross-references have been standardized
as "see Surname, Given" in the comments column.

To all Chicago researchers and others who might have
occasion to refer to the death index of the Dziennik Chicagoski:

Having used these index books quite successfully
to find obits of relatives, I assumed that all my Chicago relatives
with obviously Polish-sounding names would be listed. When my great-great-grandmother
didn't show up, I was quite stumped. An e-mail from Fred Hoffman
confirmed that not all deaths were listed. They charged money to
place the obit,and not everybody had the money. Separate lists of "zmarli" appeared
without details, presumably at no charge. Tom Hollowak indicated
that in the early volumes the"zmarli" lists were included
in the index, but he thought this practice may have been dropped
in later years as they became more numerous. It was his guess that
far less than 25% of the relevant deaths were caught in the index.
He also thought that some believed that placing an obituary was unnecessary,
since all the friends, relatives,and parishioners would know of the
death anyway.

This is mentioned not as a limitation of the index
volumes, which do a wonderful job of doing what they say they do,
which is point to the display-type obituaries in the newspaper. I
mention it to caution other researchers that just because someone
we're looking for isn't in the index, it doesn't mean they weren't
there. This can also apply to the death index available on microfiche
at the LDS libraries. This can also apply at cemeteries, where pauper
funeral records may have been removed after 25 years. This, I am
told, was the practice at St. Adalbert's where "term" graves
were re-used after 25 years.